A civil rights advocacy group, the Human Rights Writers Association has lamented the failure of the Department of State Security, DSS, and other security agencies in the country to arrest criminals who burgled Aso Rock a year ago.
According to HURIWA, it is shameful that the DSS, Nigeria Police Force, Nigerian Army, National Intelligence Agency, and other security agencies collectively failed to fish out the burglars.
The residence of the Chief of Staff to the President, Ibrahim Gambari, was attacked by burglars inside the Presidential Villa, Abuja in May last year.
One year after the embarrassing incident, which President Muhammadu Buhari’s media aide, Garba Shehu, described then as “a foolish attempt”, no arrest has been made.
In a statement on Tuesday, HURIWA’s National Coordinator, Emmanuel Onwubiko, decried the ‘incompetence of the security agents and their failure to arrest the Aso Rock burglars’.
Onwubiko said that the failure has buoyed burglars and bandits so much so that they sacked Abuja villagers and caused dwellers to flee their homes despite living in the seat of power, kilometres away from President Buhari.
The statement read, “It is shameful and a pointer to the inefficiency of all the security agents that one year after daring burglars invaded the residence of a whole Chief of Staff to the President, Ibrahim Gambari, a street to that of the President in Aso Villa, the police, the DSS, the Army and others are yet to fish out the perpetrators. Or have they gotten the so-called burglars but failed to revert to Nigerians about the development?
“The whole security architecture is also yet to be ascertained how armed robbers gained access into the ‘well-fortified’ Presidential Villa manned by a combined team of policemen, DSS operatives, and men of the Presidential Guards Brigade of the Nigeria Army. Sadly, till date, this invasion has yet to be resolved.
“Contrastively, more than 725 people have been arrested for storming the United State Capitol building on January 6, 2021. Over 71 rioters have also received criminal sentences, while the rest are waiting for their trials or haven’t yet reached plea agreements for charges ranging from obstruction of an official proceeding to assault.
“The continuous state of insecurity in Nigeria and the shameless incapacity of the security agencies to secure even the FCT is now obvious. If the security agents cannot even secure Aso Villa and the FCT which is about the smallest state if we take it to be a state and the seat of national power, then the hope of the common man is quashed.
“It’s pathetic that FCT residents now flee to the central business district of Abuja over attacks and invasion by marauding bandits in communities outside of the Central Areas of the metropolis.
“The Buhari regime must wake up and proffer radical solutions to the insecurity situation in the country.
“Nigerians must also demand accountability from the security agencies because defence sector got the largest chunk of budget this year. why is nobody being punished for failing to safeguard lives of Nigerians despite that the cardinal role of the government is the security of lives and property? Enough is enough.”
